


Capture the King

by georgiamagnolia



Category: Man From U.N.C.L.E.
Genre: Episode Related, Gen, Mission Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-02
Updated: 2011-08-02
Packaged: 2017-10-22 03:09:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/233094
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/georgiamagnolia/pseuds/georgiamagnolia
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Napoleon finds trouble even when he is not on assignment, and of course Illya gets invited to the party but not in the way he might have expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Capture the King

The THRUSH guard pointed his weapon at Napoleon’s midsection, gesturing toward a hall where a light was flickering. Napoleon thought he could have a chance in the dimness to jump the guard but that wasn’t going to happen. Two more guards joined them, grabbed Napoleon by the arms and pulled him into the darkness.

“The boss says in the showers with this one.”

“Well great, easier to clean up the mess.”

The guard that had remained silent gripped Napoleon’s elbow harder.

  
They beat him. It wasn’t as if Napoleon never got a punch of his own in every once in a while, but the constant watch by the guard with the gun kept him from doing a lot of damage to his adversaries, not to mention the handcuffs.

When they had worn him down some they hooked the links of the handcuffs through a hook hanging by a chain from the ceiling. After that they cut his suit off of him. The guards rifled his pockets where they found loose change and a business card.

“Napoleon, huh? Wasn’t he a king or something?”

“An emperor.” The silent guard finally spoke.

“Fitting, I’d say,” the guard with the gun laughed as the first one took out a knife and cut the shorts and undershirt off their prisoner.

The guards left and the door made a solid thunking sound when they slammed it shut.

Napoleon could barely touch the floor with his toes, just enough to ease the ache in his wrists until the cramping in his calves and thighs started and he had to let himself hang again from his wrists.

Then the water started spraying, hard jets of punishing cold against his flesh. He gritted his teeth and felt his jaw throb where he’d been punched more than once.

The blasting water came and went in an indecipherable pattern and for an indeterminate amount of time. To Napoleon it felt like hours that he swung from the chains. The water stopped for good and the two chatty guards returned. The one that Napoleon though of as Gun came in first and the one Napoleon had dubbed Mouthy followed. Their silent friend was not in evidence.

“So Emperor, you seem to have found yourself in the wrong place at a very bad time,” Gun said as Mouthy gave Napoleon a shove hard to the kidneys. The speaker put down his weapon and pulled a pair of gloves from his pocket, pulling them on while he circled the now swinging prisoner.

Napoleon ignored the feeling of vulnerability he had as a result of hanging naked from a ceiling beam and tried to control the swinging enough to aim a kick towards at least one of his captors. Gun pulled back his arm to wind up a punch when alarms started ringing.

Napoleon’s captors ran for the door, Gun grabbing his weapon and Mouthy slamming the door shut again. The water didn’t start up again so Napoleon started to work on getting his cuffed hands on the chain above him to pull himself up to one of the other beams overhead.

  
Illya knew he was being followed. The young man wasn’t very good at it. Of course, following anyone on foot was a bit of an art and like any art it took practice and patience to hone the skill. He debated with himself about whether to let the kid catch him and then interrogate the young man or to just lose the tail and be done with it. It had been a long day and he was looking forward to being home with the quiet of some music and a solitary dinner. He didn’t mind so much the paperwork that came with filling in for Napoleon when he was absent from headquarters, but dealing with all the differing and very strong personalities in Section Two could sometimes be a trial. Even at his charming and diplomatic best, he found it tiring. And when he was not in a particularly charming or diplomatic mood, he found the energy it took to act the part was much more draining.

Illya led the young man into an alley that looked like a dead end. Illya knew it wasn’t and was counting on his shadow thinking he had gained the upper hand. Illya slowed his pace and caught sight of his tail reflected in a window. The young man had no idea the trap he was walking into, and Illya was in the mood to teach him a thing or two. He turned to confront the kid.

  
Of course they hadn’t left his clothes in the room. No explosive buttons or lock picking shoelaces for him, just bare concrete and cold water. Napoleon crawled across the exposed beams as carefully as he could with his hands still cuffed. He positioned himself above the door and debated his chances of subduing both the guards or of sneaking out the open door and locking them inside his prison. The alarms had finally stopped and he figured that whatever the emergency was would be done with soon and he’d again have visitors. He ignored his cramping calves and stayed as still as he could crouched like a gargoyle above the cell door.

  
The young man put his hands in the air, far out from his body as if he were posing for the cover of a pulp detective novel and he was the suspect. “She said you’d figure me out.”

“Who said that and why? And put your hands down, I haven’t even drawn a weapon.”

“My boss.” He spoke around a fat lip and a bruise was blooming on his chin. “She said you’d see me quick and that I shouldn’t resist or it would go bad for me.”

“From her or from me?” Illya stepped back, closer to the escape if he were going to have to use it.

“Both, I think.”

“Why are you following me and who is your boss that she is sending you on a fool’s errand to tail me if she knows it isn’t going to work?”

“I have a message. Your king is in check. But the rooks have other distractions if you hurry.”

“I have no idea what you are talking about.”

“She said to tell you that she owed you one for getting her out of a basement full of furor once.” The young man dropped a crumpled piece of paper and started walking backwards toward the mouth of the alley. “She said you’d understand. And to be quick about it.”

Illya finally drew his weapon and kept his eyes on the kid as he advanced. He nudged the paper and couldn’t see anything much to it. “Hold it there, young man.”

“I can’t. Sorry mister. That’s all the information she gave me.” The young man turned and ran and Illya thought about giving chase, but when he picked up the paper he stopped short.

The elegant copperplate handwriting looked familiar and it was signed only with a drawing of a spider with a distinctive hourglass on its belly. “He’s in the basement. Debt erased.” It was written on the back of a flyer announcing the closing of Fort Totten Dry Cleaning.

Illya holstered his weapon and traded it for his communicator. “So much for taking the subway home tonight,” he muttered as he assembled the antennae and opened a channel to headquarters.

  
The alarms started up again and Napoleon waited. He could hear a commotion above him even over the alarms and then the door opened and he dropped like a dead weight on who or whatever was coming inside.

  
Illya rolled with the fall and came up on top of his adversary only to find that it wasn’t a THRUSH that had tried to drop him but instead his partner; wet, naked and plenty unhappy with his circumstances.

“Fancy meeting you here.”

“Nothing fancy about any of this, partner. Though I am thrilled to see you, you’re bruising my bruises with your bony damn ribs.”

“Sorry.” Illya rolled to his feet and offered a hand up to Napoleon who reached out with his cuffed hands for the assistance.

“If Angelique knew you would greet her like that, maybe she’d have come and gotten you herself.”

“Not likely. This was supposed to be a safe house for the new head of the New York division of THRUSH. She wouldn’t risk her position… what do you mean Angelique would come down herself?”

Illya showed Napoleon the note then started working on the handcuff lock. “She told her lackey to tell me that my king was in check, also that we’d rescued her from a furor.”

“Well, a führer in any case. What‘s a mostly dead dictator between friends.”

“Oh, Napoleon, really.” Illya rolled his eyes at his partner and pocketed the now open handcuffs. “Get dressed so we can go.”

“I’d love to but they relieved me of every stitch.”

“And your luggage? Is it upstairs where they’ve been searching it?”

“Not likely. I rented a locker at the airport when I recognized one of the THRUSH bodyguards and decided to follow him. I did call it in to headquarters, but the connection wasn’t very good. Odd that.”

“Very odd. Let’s investigate that after we find you something to put on, I am in no mood to get arrested for indecency.”

Napoleon might have had a comeback but Illya was already out the door.

Down the hall they found Napoleon’s shredded suit and his communicator and weapon. Illya threw him a jumpsuit after ripping the bird insignia off the shoulder.

Napoleon looked at the jumpsuit and then at Illya.

“What? It’s clean.”

“It’s, ah, rather roomy.”

“It’s a jumpsuit, Napoleon, it isn’t going to be tailored to fit.”

“What I mean is that I’d really like some shorts, thanks.”

“Go commando, we have places to go and people to interrogate. Section Three will be done cleaning out the upper floors shortly.”

Napoleon frowned and stepped into the jumpsuit. “It’ll chafe.”

“You’ll never notice after Medical gives you some painkillers for the beating you took.”

“I never take those.”

Illya just gave Napoleon a smug grin and led the way back up the stairs to check on the progress of their coworkers.

  
In the back of a limousine down the block a blonde woman sat next to a young man and watched as several men were led from the defunct dry cleaners and hustled into some unmarked vans. Last came a man in a dark suit and another in a jumpsuit and shoulder holster. They headed for a sedan and led the convoy of UNCLE vehicles away.

“The Emperor found something to wear after all.”

“Of course he did, if only to disappoint me. And he found a whole nest of misinformation as well.” Her voice was smug.

“How long will we have?”

“Oh, I hope they won’t figure it out for a few months, but just in case, we’d best be ready to move by the end of next week. I would much prefer to be more centrally located anyway. The better to build my web, my dear.”


End file.
